


some Wrinkle In Time bullshit

by Anonymous



Category: Ted Lasso (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Cup Wish, F/M, Gen, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-18
Updated: 2020-12-18
Packaged: 2021-03-10 18:08:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,818
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28141413
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: In 2012, Roy Kent made a wish on the European Cup.In 2020, he travels back in time.
Relationships: Keeley Jones/Roy Kent
Comments: 7
Kudos: 59
Collections: Anonymous, Yuletide 2020





	some Wrinkle In Time bullshit

**Author's Note:**

  * For [treewishes](https://archiveofourown.org/users/treewishes/gifts).



> A very Happy Yuletide to you! I really liked your with you canon-but-with-a-supernatural-twist idea and I hope you enjoy!

“Onward. Forward,” Lasso said, finishing his speech in that unassuming way of his before heading into his office with a passing nod at his coaching staff. The locker room was quiet for a moment before the chatter picked back up. It wasn’t happy, there was still a heaviness to the air—professional footballers fucking hated losing—but there was something else there that made Roy think this wasn’t the end for them. Even if the club had been relegated. 

Onward. Forward.

As much as Roy had come to respect Lasso and his ludicrous methods, he couldn’t help but wonder what if. What might have been. He knew it was pointless, but he couldn’t help himself. Why did Jamie fucking Tartt only realize the point of a lesson until after he’d gone? And of course, the cherry on top of the whole shit sundae was he used what they'd taught him to fucking send them packing back to the Championship. Why did it feel like betrayal when his body couldn’t do what he needed it to do anymore? Roy absentmindedly picked at the bandage holding the ice on his knee in place. Fact was, it happened and there was no changing reality. The league was finished and their season was over. But still the thought niggled at him. Maybe if he'd been quicker or tackled harder or _something_. Or maybe even if they'd been perfect, they'd still be fucking relegated. Roy felt Keeley lift her head and look at him, squeezing where their hands were still clasped together. 

“I can feel you thinking, you know?”

Roy grunted, trying to suppress a smile. He didn’t turn to look at her because then the game would be up. “Can you?”

She forced her way into his field of vision and let go of his hands only to grab at the sides of his face and force him to look at her. Keeley’s eyes darted all around while she absentmindedly worried her lower lip. The simple and obvious show of her feelings made something gentle and warm unfurl in Roy’s chest. 

“Do I need any instructions from the physio? Is it only sponge baths for you from now on,” she asked, waggling her eyebrows with a sly smile.

“I’ll need to go for an MRI tomorrow. I’ve got a brace I need to wear. Ice and elevate until we know more. The usual,” he said, with a dismissive wave of his hand. 

“Good thing I have so many pillows. We can leave them all around and keep your knee elevated in every room.”

Roy couldn't help but crack a smile at the thought. Keeley would scatter her frilly pink pillows all around her house, just in case he might need them. “The appointment’s early tomorrow. I think I’ll stay at mine. No point making you get up early too.”

“It’s no trouble. I have an early call tomorrow with a Japanese whiskey company for an endorsement for Isaac anyway,” Keeley said with a shrug.

Roy looked at Issac swaying to music only he could hear, his shirt missing and only one sock remaining.

“Whiskey. Isaac. Really?”

“They’re a new company and we’re proposing an alternative branding strategy to all that stodgy stuff they would normally go for. And Isaac really liked the idea.”

Roy looked back at Keeley, tucking a stray flyaway hair behind her ear. He leaned in to kiss her gently and rested his forehead against her.

“I’ll be fine.”

Keeley didn’t say anything for a long moment. She seemed to find whatever she was looking for in his face and nodded. 

“Alright then. I’ll see you tomorrow, yeah? You’ll tell me how everything goes?”

“You’ll be my first call,” Roy promised.

Onward. Forward. 

There was really nowhere else to go, was there?

.

Roy bolted upright, pressing the heels of his hands into his eyes, trying to force back the sudden migraine.

What had he been dreaming of? He had been in the locker room again, but the blue was wrong. Couldn't have been Nelson Road. And he felt good. Happy. Like nothing could ever feel this way and we wanted to keep doing this forever.

Munich. 2012. The Champions League.

He hadn't thought of that in years. Lamps and Terry had gotten plastered from the free beer, hanging off each other's shoulders, whispering and giggling. At some point Didier had been wearing nothing but his medal, swanning about the dressing room. It didn't matter much these days, and pundits only brought it up to remind everyone Roy's best days were well behind him.

He could feel pulse of blood in his head keep time with every heartbeat. _Fucking hell, it hurt_.

He’d been holding the cup, thumb brushing over the fresh engraving of Chelsea Football Club, and wanting something to happen, but the harder he tried to think about it the more it squirmed away. Roy tried remembering what had happened, not in the dream, but when it had been his turn with the cup. He remembered thinking the thing was lighter than he'd expected. Colder, too. But that was it. And almost as soon as they'd had the parade, it was on the next season and before he knew it, Roy was looking at the end of his career in sight. Sighing, he lay back down and let Keeley settle back into his side.

What. The. Fuck.

Roy turned to look at Keeley, and then at the rest of the room. Yeah, Definitely Keeley's bedroom. In her house. Where he had definitely _not_ gone to sleep last night. He turned back, and it really was Keeley, asleep in her ratty tie-dyed jumper and red Richmond warm-ups from two seasons ago that she’d stolen from him. 

Here he was, in Keeley's bed. When he'd definitely fallen asleep in his own bed, in his own flat. And they hadn't even given him anything that strong for the pain. 

Fumbling for his phone, Roy took one look at the date and hurled it at the wall.

Keeley murmured something and Roy felt like an asshole.

"Sorry. Go back to sleep," he whispered and only got a snore in response. Keeley really could sleep like the dead sometimes. 

This was not fucking happening.

Fucking time travel wasn't possible. Bullshit, fifth dimension traveling shit wasn't real.

And yet.

Roy rubbed at his knee and stilled. It ached in that dull way he'd just gotten used to as he'd gotten older, but it didn't hurt anymore. He'd had injury scares before and a muscle had turned out only to be sprained, not torn. But the pain had never just gone away the next day.

He looked at his phone, sitting innocently on the floor. A small voice in the back of his mind that sounded suspiciously like Phoebe, who still believed in Santa Claus and the fucking Tooth Fairy, whispered, _It doesn't hurt because it hasn't happened yet._

Roy rubbed his hands over his face.

What the fuck.

Suddenly remembering what had happened the day before yesterday (which might also be today, again) Roy thundered down the stairs, hoping he was wrong, opened the door to Jamie Tartt, that stupid confused look on his stupid face with his hair slicked back in that stupid style of his, hand paused in mid-air about to ring the doorbell, with two coffees balanced in a take out tray in the other.

“No,” Roy said, shutting the door again. Tartt would absolutely take the piss and play a joke on him, but he wouldn't be caught in the same outfit twice. 

This was _not_ fucking happening.

“What the fuck? Kent? Why are you here? Where’s Keeley?” Tartt shouted, pounding on the door. 

“Oh, shit. Sorry, yeah, Jamie’s coming over,” Keeley said in a rush, coming down the stairs. She barreled past Roy and flung open the door, before pausing and turning back to peck Roy on the corner of his mouth.

“Oh, that is disgusting,” Tartt whined and Roy had a moment of vertigo. This had already happened. Well, not exactly, but this had already happened. 

“Jamie, you wanted my help. Don’t be a dick.”

Roy grunted. It was too early for any of this shit. “I’ll make coffee,” he said and turned away before either of them could reply. _Should I make scones?_ , he thought a little bit hysterically, remembering the awkward silence from last time. He was gonna punch whoever was in charge of this fucking mess if it meant he needed to have an emotional connection with Jamie Fucking Tartt. 

“But I brought you coffee,” Roy heard Tartt say as he wandered back into the kitchen. He didn’t see it, but he could hear the shrug in Keeley’s voice when she replied, “Well, then I’ll have two.” 

Sitting around the table in his pants and socks was no less awkward than the first time. Tartt kept trying to glare at him, but seemed to get distracted and it would shift back into that confused expression that made Roy want to punch his face. Keeley took her coffee from Roy and poured in the extra coffee Tartt had brought .

“Alright, Jamie. What was it you wanted to talk about?”

Roy tried to keep his breathing even. He glared at Jamie when he called Roy a dry, old shit and took pleasure in the annoyed huff when he taunted him back with Phoebe’s favorite move, zipping and locking his lips, throwing the imaginary key at him. They were about the same maturity level anyway.

“Ted Lasso is trying to play fucking mind games with me. Saying nice shit about me on the telly, trying to get in my head.”

There was the vertigo again and Roy could barely hear Keeley’s response over the roaring in his ears. Tartt was talking again and Roy remembered how this played out the first time. Roy was going to take offense at his attitude, Jamie would storm off, and somehow it all ended with Richmond getting relegated because Jamie Tartt, the Premier League's most selfish player made the unselfish pass. But what was Roy supposed to do about it? Could anything he say actually change anything? If he wanted a chance, a real chance to make a difference, he'd need to go back to the start of the season. Or maybe the start of last season. It made the pain his head he'd been trying to ignore surge back with a vengeance.

“It wasn’t the manager that sent you back to City,” Roy said, the words tumbling out his mouth without much thought. He watched Tartt’s mouth hang open before snapping shut.

“What you mean, of course it was Lasso. And now he’s pretending to be all—”

“No, it was Welton,” Roy interrupted before he really understood what he was doing. Tartt looked like he was going to argue, so Roy barreled on. “Rumour is she wanted to run the club into the ground to get back at Mannion for being such a colossal fuck-up of a husband. Lasso was upset your loan had ended so suddenly and told her so. We lost a week trying to rework the lineup without you in it.”

It was almost satisfying seeing Jamie Tartt speechless. 

Keeley was looking contemplative, running her fingernail around the rim of her mug. “So many things make sense now,” she murmured.

“Now, she’s having second thought about ruining the club, but well. We’re eighteenth in the table and we need a miracle or to fix the match to keep us from relegation.”

Tartt looked unsure of himself, which wasn't something Roy had ever thought about his former teammate. You could count on the sun rising, Arsenal finishing fourth, and Jame Tartt being absurdly confident. Roy took a sip of coffee and the three of them sat in silence for a long while.

"Yeah. Well. Enjoy the view from the bench, tomorrow," Tartt said, standing, but it didn't bother Roy as much as it had before. Hopefully he'd get at least get that last ditch tackle on Tartt, blowing out his knee might even be worth it. 

"Right. Cause you're starting because Guardiola thinks you're good, and not because Agüero needs the rest and it's a pointless game for City," Roy needled. He shouldn't stoop to Tartt's level, but there was only so much Roy could take before hitting back. And he'd forgotten last time. Maybe this fifth dimension, time travel bullshit had some advantages after all.

"Whatever," Tartt mumbled under his breath, rolling his eyes. Roy tracked Tartt until he'd left and the shut the door behind him. He turned to find Keeley looking at him.

"What?"

"Did you throw your phone at the wall, or did I dream that?" Keeley asked.

"It forced me to update the software," he blurted, leaning over to distract her with a kiss, before he thought too much about it and she could tell something was wrong. Even if this was happening, no need to tell anyone. They'd probably just think he was mental, anyway. Best not to worry anyone. Yeah. He'd just live these two days again

Onward. Forward. 

Fantastic. Now he was talking like Ted fucking Lasso. This couldn't get much worse.

.

Roy sat in front of his locker with a bag of ice on his knee and his hand held firmly in Keeley's grip. This time, though, the mood in the dressing room was raucous and he didn't even try to hide his smile. 

He still wasn't sure how the fuck they'd managed to force Manchester City to a draw.

The game had gone like nothing Roy had expected—it went the same way the remembered the first time through played. Or if not exactly the same, close enough that he had a creeping feeling of déjà vu. He even managed to fuck up his knee again chasing down Tartt. But it was still worth it for the look on the poncy bastard's face.

He let Sam pull him up, but before hobbling off the pitch he paused. Roy wasn't sure he was meant to change anything or even if he could, but if he didn't try something he'd regret it and he'd had plenty of regret in his career already; he didn't need anymore. Roy pulled Sam to him and shoved a finger into his teammate's chest. "You'll be fine without me. We'll score. Just make sure those idiots get back on defense afterwards, yeah? Don't waste time celebrating like we've won the league," he said, poking at Sam's chest for emphasis. Sam's answering smile was too much to handle and Roy rolled his eyes before making his way off the pitch.

Nelson Road was the type of old ground where you could hear near everything happening on the pitch from the dressing room. Last time, the muffled cheers followed by that gut-wrenching silence had told Roy everything he'd needed to know about the end of the match. This time, he hadn't even bothered to shy away from Keeley when she found him in front of his locker, too focused on straining to hear any sign from the crowd that Rojas had scored. 

And then it had happened. A cheer went up, so loud it startled Keeley who immediately checked the score on her phone. 

The next minute was agony for Roy. Before, he couldn't help watching through the highlights and had seen how quickly Richmond went from a draw and staying in the Premier League to losing and being relegated. But somehow that dreadful silence never came this time; Roy heard the official's whistle and what sounded like twenty-five thousand people sighing in relief. 

As the team filtered into the dressing room, no one could tell him what had happened. They talked over each other, Isaac and Colin just started hugging each other and dancing around, Dani was talking a mile a minute in Spanish, and it hurt to walk, so Roy sat in front of his locker, smiling so much his cheeks hurt and tried to make sense of the excited noise of the dressing room. 

There was nothing quite like the sound of a happy team, reveling in their success. (Even if this was just a draw. They'd survived. And surprised a hell of a lot of people.)

In the midst of the cacophony and Lasso trying to make a speech but getting sidetracked first by Nathan, then Rebecca Welton, before he could even try to get everyone's attention, it came to him, clear as day.

_I want to do this again._

That's what he'd thought while holding the Champions League trophy.

At the time, Roy had meant winning. But looking around the dressing room, filled with his teammates' smiling, happy faces, Roy couldn't help but wonder if maybe someone out there knew something that he hadn't at the time. 

Time travel was still a load of bullshit, though, and he hoped it never happened again.

.


End file.
